The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men
by Lucillia
Summary: When Naruto decides to skip past the Kage Bunshin and picks another jutsu to learn from the Forbidden Scroll, Madara - who'd dearly love to kill the brat - is left scrambling to salvage his plans.
1. Chapter 1

Naruto groaned when he realized that the first item in the scroll was a Bunshin technique, which meant that he'd never get it down, not in a million years. Sighing, he turned to the next item in the scroll which seemed to be a complicated flow-chart diagram of some sort. Growling, he unfurled the scroll even further. Yet another jutsu he couldn't make heads or tails of that was accompanied by a number of gruesome illustrations.

He kept unfurling the scroll until he'd reached the next to last item on it. At first he couldn't make heads or tails of what he was looking at. Then, he realized that if he kinda squinted and looked at the picture sideways, he could sorta understand it. The smaller picture next to the list of handseals seemed incomplete somehow, as if something were missing. The complicated scribbles someone had added to the margins didn't help all that much though.

As he was figuring out exactly what the technique appeared to be missing, Iruka turned up looking none too happy to see him there. Not noticing that the scroll had completely unfurled while he was reading, or even spotting what came after the Jutsu he was looking at, Naruto looked up from the scroll he'd been studying as intently as he could in spite of his less than stellar literacy skills.

"Aw man, you found me already?" Naruto said, pouting since he wasn't sure he'd actually learned anything from the scroll. "I haven't gotten everything ready yet."

"Ready for what?" Iruka asked.

"If you hand me some paper and some sealing ink, I'll show you." Naruto replied.

"What do you need these for?" Iruka asked as he handed over said items which he'd had on his person because he'd been studying how to make storage seals and had carried the supplies in his vest in order to use in his free time.

"Mizuki said that if I can learn one technique in this scroll I can graduate!" Naruto exclaimed as he opened the bottle of the sealing ink. "I figure that if I can find a squirrel or something, I can show you what I learned."

"What did you learn?" Iruka asked, somewhat fearfully looking at the scroll which had rolled entirely open, displaying a very familiar seal.

"Dunno what it's called." Naruto said as he prepared the slip of paper.

While Naruto's reading skills were nearly non-existent and his handwriting was barely legible, one area that he surprisingly wasn't lacking in was drawing. That, and he was quite capable of copying a picture, and in some cases improving it if he had it in front of him to look at. Had the art been presented to him in the right way, Naruto would've been quite the forger.

"There, now that control seal thingy is perfect." Naruto said as he finished drawing on the slip of paper that Iruka had handed him with little to no idea of what he'd just created, only knowing that it looked right.

Mizuki, who'd seen the scroll be unfurled to the point where the seal that had been used to place the Kyuubi inside its vessel was revealed and had been warily waiting for Naruto to break the seal, decided it was safe enough to come out of hiding at that point since the Kyuubi had quite spectacularly failed to escape as he feared it would. While Iruka was examining the seal that Naruto had made, unable to make heads or tails of it because it was so far beyond his level of understanding it wasn't even funny, Mizuki made his attack.

After Mizuki had revealed to Naruto that he was the vessel for the Kyuubi and there was a chase and a fight and Iruka saved Naruto's life and revealed that he viewed Naruto as a human being, there was a moment where Naruto and Mizuki stood facing off. In one world, Naruto would've pulled out about a thousand Kage Bunshin and pounded Mizuki into the dirt. In this one however...

"What are you doing?" Mizuki asked as he watched the Uzumaki boy cycle through several handsigns as he said "You know, I was going to bring my pet frog back first but..."

The last thing the arrogant Mizuki who'd wanted to show Naruto the true meaning of despair when his jutsu the boy was attempting inevitably failed to defeat him heard was "Edo Tensei!"

Normally this wouldn't work, considering the requirements, but due to the fact that Naruto hadn't been thinking of bringing anyone in particular back and the fact that Naruto had had a habit of fishing things he found to be potentially useful out of the trash or any other sort of junkpile, it had worked on that day.

The junkpile that Naruto had fished through on the way home after his mood had been given a bit of a lift because he'd been given a bit of hope by Mizuki had been created by a woman who had been clearing out her deceased grandmother's home, unwittingly tossing out several priceless treasures that would have had village historians and collectors alike salivating over the possibility of even looking at them in the process. When Naruto had seen the lock of hair that was of a certain shade of raven-wing black which shone with blue highlights under certain lighting sticking out of the middle of the trashpile, he had taken it with the intention of cutting it so he had several sections of the correct length and dividing it even further in order to sell it to Sasuke's fangirls.

Having a living sacrifice for the Edo Tensei and a genetic sample that happened to have fallen out of his pocket in the rough vicinity of Mizuki and the Devil's own luck on his side, Naruto managed to successfully complete the Jutsu despite the fact that by all rights it should not have worked. Where an arrogant Mizuki had been standing was a coffin. As a somewhat confused Naruto wondered what the hell the coffin was for, the lid to the upright coffin opened and slammed to the ground.

"Aw crap, he's _old_!" Naruto said while the elderly man who'd previously been in the coffin took a single step outside the coffin which fell to the ground behind him.

Grumbling about how his new jutsu completely sucked and how it had probably been Mizuki who'd ruined it, Naruto tied the seal that he'd created to a kunai that he'd picked up and moved over to the old man who'd appeared in Mizuki's place. Following instructions he'd only half understood, Naruto sunk the kunai with his modified seal into the body of the elderly man who was leaning on a kama as if it were a cane. The old man sluggishly blinked as he looked down at Naruto. Then, the man looked like he was thinking about something, and blinked again.

"What the hell did you do to me boy?" the old man rasped.

"Um, I used the Edo Tensei thing and you popped out of the box." Naruto said.

"Are you sure this is the Edo Tensei? I should have been able to break the contract seal if it were." the old man rasped, leaning more heavily on the Kama, looking as if he wanted to kill the child in front of him as he asked.

"Um, Contract seal? You mean that control thing right? I fixed it." Naruto replied, looking somewhat proud of himself for having completed one of the Jutsu from the scroll even if Mizuki had kinda ruined it.

"After you release me, you'd better pray that I never find you again." the old man snarled.

"Huh? Release? How do you do that?" Naruto asked.

The old man growled at this, his eyes turning a blazing Sharingan red. Whatever he'd planned on doing however, it didn't work. Naruto wasn't paying attention however, since he was more focused on the injured Academy Instructor who was staring at the old man with wide eyes.

"Hey Iruka-sensei?" Naruto asked, catching the rather shaken Chunin's attention.

"Yes?" the rather ashen man asked.

"Even though I can't send him back, do I still pass?" Naruto asked.


	2. Chapter 2

In his office, Sarutobi Hiruzen groaned as he buried his face in his hands. Trust Naruto to find and use what was probably the most heinous jutsu in existence without even realizing what he had done wrong. There was a reason his sensei had abandoned research into the Edo Tensei and tried to bury the existence of the jutsu after-all.

Looking back into his crystal ball, he saw a rather nervous looking Iruka handing his hitai-ate over to the Uzumaki boy while the elderly man who was clearly a Uchiha if his eyes were any indication looked on sourly. Something like this could seriously strain the budding relationship between Naruto and Iruka. Had the man thought the boy had known what he'd done, it likely would have destroyed it completely already.

He would have to impress upon the child the severity of his actions, and make him promise to never use that jutsu again.

* * *

As they made their way to Ichiraku Ramen, Iruka studied the boy to whom he'd just handed his hitai-ate. Despite the fact that the boy had spoken of using the technique he'd just used on Mizuki to return his pet from the dead, he didn't think Naruto entirely understood what he'd just done. Thanks to the fact that Naruto had been rejected by society for his entire life, he'd had to learn social norms by looking in from the outside. Considering this, he shouldn't have been surprised to discover that Naruto's sense of Right and Wrong was completely skewed since he hadn't had someone around to teach him Right from Wrong and had therefore had to learn what few morals he'd had from television, books, and whatever went on in that strange little head of his.

Apparently, what Naruto had watched and read during his childhood had never dealt with bringing the dead back, and why doing such things was morally questionable at the very least. It looked that this was yet another of the things he would have to teach the boy if he wanted him to be able to function in society.

The old man that Naruto had summoned from the grave unsettled him greatly, and not only because his friend of many years who'd turned traitor had been used as the sacrifice that had returned him right before his very eyes. There was something disturbingly familiar about the ancient Uchiha who'd raised his hand and his weapon to attack the Uzumaki child who'd summoned him any number of times only to discover that he was unable to do so. That, and the man's muttering about what he wanted to do to the village sent shivers up and down his spine.

Trying to paste on a smile for his student whom he was treating, he took a seat at the counter of Teuchi's stand which was just opening for the day in order to catch the early early bird crowd and the late crowd that was on their way home. Naruto took a seat beside him, and the old man that Naruto brought back from the dead stood nearby, apparently as far away as he could get from the boy who'd summoned him, considering the fact that he didn't go any further.

"Aren't you hungry?" Naruto asked around a mouthful of noodles as he was scarfing down on his first bowl.

"No, I'm fine." he replied, not feeling all that hungry, what with the events from the night before and all those injuries he'd gotten in the fight with Mizuki including that gash in his back that he'd mostly gotten healed using a jutsu he'd learned back during his Genin days.

"Aren't you hungry?" Naruto asked the ancient man he'd summoned after he'd finished inhaling his ramen.

"No." the old man who was leaning on his kama said. "And besides, I don't care for ramen."

"Don't care for ramen?!" Naruto exclaimed, sounding stunned. "Why not? Ramen's the food of the gods!"

"Inarizushi is the food of the gods!" the old man snapped at Naruto.

Grumbling about his obviously defective jutsu, Naruto turned back to Teuchi and ordered another bowl of ramen.

"Who's that Naruto?" Teuchi asked as he handed Naruto his second bowl of the day.

"Dunno," Naruto replied as he dug into his noodles. "He's just some old man I summoned from the afterlife with a jutsu I found in the forbidden scroll."

Both Teuchi and Ayame looked appropriately horrified by this revelation.

"For your information brat." the old man spat. "I happen to be Uchiha Madara."

"Really? So you're like that Sasuke jerk's granddad or something? He'll be happy to see you." Naruto who'd apparently slept through one too many history classes said.

"Why did you bring Madara back from the dead?" Teuchi asked almost looking as if he'd close up shop if Naruto asked for another bowl of ramen. He understood why, considering how immoral Naruto's actions would have been under normal circumstances, and how immoral they'd still been under the ones in which the man had been summoned. That, and summoning the first ninja to betray Konoha back from the dead was a rather stupid thing to do, especially considering what Madara had done at the Valley of the End, and what Naruto was.

"I dunno. I wasn't really thinking at the time, other than that the jutsu I learned in the forbidden scroll thing was the strongest jutsu I knew, and that Mizuki would hurt Iruka-sensei if I didn't stop him." Naruto replied. "I didn't think that I wouldn't have been able to send whoever came over back to where he came from once it was over."

"Why can't you send him back?" Ayame asked, apparently excusing Naruto's crime against nature since he'd done it to save someone else if her expression was any indication.

"I don't know how." Naruto replied. "I kinda know how I got him here, but I don't remember everything from that scroll thing, and Iruka-sensei wouldn't let me read it again before the ANBU guys came to pick it up. They tried to take the old dude with them as well, but he just turned up back where me an' Iruka-sensei were a minute later."

"Oh dear." Teuchi said.

"Oh dear." was an understatement as far as Iruka was concerned. After the ANBU had examined him and saw that he'd mostly taken care of his injuries, they'd handed him some bandages for what was left of the wound on his back and the numerous smaller injuries he had and turned him and Naruto loose before they carried off the scroll and the old man who hadn't struggled since he'd apparently wanted to be away from Naruto and in the clutches of someone who might be able to send him back to the afterlife. Before they'd even reached the outskirts of the village, the old man was back and not happy to be so if the manner in which he'd destroyed a sizable number of trees was any indication.

Naruto was apparently stuck with the old man who was apparently the first shinobi to betray Konoha. Whether the boy deserved it or not remained to be seen however.

* * *

As Madara watched the blond Uzumaki who was dressed in threadbare white pyjamas and a cap that looked like it was eating its head crawl into bed an hour after they'd left Ichiraku Ramen, he longed to strangle the child. This was most definitely not how he'd wanted to be brought back from the dead. It was too soon for one...

"Oh, right, do you want the bed?" the Uzumak boy said, crawling out of the bed he'd been climbing into.

"Why would I want your bed?" he asked the whisker cheeked child whose face was naggingly familiar for some reason, and not just because he possessed the standard Uzumaki features minus the signature red hair.

"To sleep on." the Uzumaki boy mumbled. "Seeing as you're a guest and all."

He paused and stared at the boy for a minute. Normally if some brat had summoned him with the Edo Tensei, they would be demanding that he do their bidding, the Uzumaki boy however had offered him food and his own bed to sleep in.

"I don't sleep." he said, guessing that that was likely true, considering the fact that he didn't feel the least bit tired. He felt old and run down, but he didn't feel tired, nor did he feel the aches and pains that had come with old age.

That could be considered a bonus at least.


	3. Chapter 3

The first clue that Tobi had that he was in deep shit was a memo from the Intelligence department informing Yagura who was nearing the end of his years as Mizukage that the Kyuubi Jinchuriki had learned the Edo Tensei and summoned some old man from the grave. The second clue came a couple days later when a letter from Nagato arrived asking what the hell was going on. He'd nearly had a heart attack when he'd reached the name Uchiha Madara. This was most definitely not supposed to be happening, seeing as Madara wasn't supposed to be back until everything was gathered, war was declared so all of the strongest shinobi in the world could be gathered in one place and eliminated, and the Jyuubi was nearly ready.

Tobi knew he had two options at that point, denounce the Madara in Konoha as a fake and hope he understood, or do damage control like crazy. Either way, he'd be stuck covering his ass and hoping and praying that he didn't get anything sharp and pointy stuck in it. While most of the Akatsuki were in it pretty much for the hell of it or for the power they'd receive later when Pein supposedly took control, Kisame was going to be pissed at the very least.

Coming to a decision, he turned and left the Mizukage to run on autopilot as he did every time he left for an extended period of time, and headed out to do damage control since he knew which was the more dangerous of the two when it came to Madara and Kisame, and how Madara would likely react if he denounced him as a fake even if it was to salvage their plan. The reason he'd headed out as quickly as he did without even bothering to make basic preparations for his journey was because he figured it would be best to get it out of the way as fast as possible since the longer it took him to respond, the guiltier he would look. Hopefully, Kisame would be an understanding individual who'd forgive him his half-truths seeing as Madara was making thr perfect world he'd told him about, and he was only the tool through which it was being done.

* * *

Madara sighed as he followed Naruto to the Academy. After he'd made the mistake of mentioning that he'd helped found Konoha, the boy wouldn't shut up about the place, apparently thinking that he'd be happy to know how the village he'd be happy to wipe off the face of the earth as if it had never existed had fared in the years since Hashirama had gone and stabbed him through the chest at the Valley of the End.

Apparently, even to the end, Hashirama had viewed him as a friend on some level. When he'd stabbed him through the chest at the end of their final battle, the sword had just barely missed both his heart and lung. He'd passed out after having his final say with his old friend/enemy - who wouldn't after the battle they had? - and the rather exhausted Hashirama who hadn't even bothered to check his pulse had left him behind after crying over his "corpse", figuring that his family would deal with the burial arrangements.

The final wound had damn near killed him back then, as had the infection he'd contracted after the battle in which he'd been stabbed with several dirty weapons and lain in a puddle of stagnant water before that newly formed waterfall that had been a result of the titanic struggle between him and Hashirama had washed him down the newly formed branch of a nearby river and he'd gotten fetched up on some rocks. He'd only been half-awake and had looked like a drowned rat when his rescuers had pulled him out, dumped him on a pallet in one of their homes, and started tending to his injuries as an act of charity.

"...And, this is the Academy. The Nidaime founded it -ttebayo!" the Uzumaki whose blood was not in question in his mind since he'd known far too many of that clan said when they reached their destination, looking proud that he'd remembered that "fact".

"What idiot told you that?!" he ended up saying after he'd come up short upon hearing that Senju effing Tobirama had been credited with the founding of Konoha's Ninja Academy. "Hashirama and I founded the Academy. It was one of the first things we did after getting Konoha off the ground. The closest Tobirama came to founding the Academy was shoveling the first scoop of dirt out of the plot that had been set aside for it because his brother and I were stuck in a meeting with the local Daimyo that we couldn't get out of."

"Really? Wow!" the Uzumaki said, apparently still slightly in awe over the fact that he was in the presence of one of the men who'd founded Konoha, having apparently not cracked open a history text that detailed what he'd done after he'd helped found the village.

At the door to the Academy which was a rather sturdy building that was covered in numerous near-invisible seals for everything from fire protection to flood protection which would probably take a Biju at the very least to destroy, the Uzumaki paused and started thinking for a moment.

"You might want to wait out here." the Uzumaki said, somewhat nervously.

"Why?" he asked, wondering what the point of his being dragged all the way out here was if he was just going to be left to sit around outside.

"Um, well, I heard one of the Instructors say that they wished they could meet the guy who'd thought up the Academy so he could drag him out back and beat the crap out of him. That, and every student has tried to blow up or burn down the Academy at least once." the Uzumaki replied, muttering the last part so quietly that he almost didn't hear him.

"All of them?" he asked, somewhat amused as he pictured Hashirama's reaction to the little kiddies trying to burn down the Academy that he'd worked so hard to have built, thinking that it would solve the world's problems when it would only make things worse in the end.

"That was me." the Uzumaki said sounding slightly embarrassed as he pointed to a bit of fire damage that had been painted over.

"Let's head inside before you end up late for your assignment." he said to the Uzumaki in a tone that was neither approving or disproving in order to change the subject. There was no way in hell he would be proud of the boy who'd undoubtedly complicated things greatly simply by existing, considering the fact that the Kyuubi was supposed to be running free right now and Konoha should've been wiped off the map already.

Trust Obito to screw everything up. Knowing him, he'd likely spared the village out of some sort of misplaced sentimentality. The boy was too much like his second eldest brother had spared that pregnant Senju who'd gone and stabbed him in the heart for his troubles.

After passing through hallways that looked like they belonged to just about any or every school of a certain size that he'd encountered, he and the Uzumaki boy ended up in a rather standard looking classroom with tiered seating which contained about twenty children who were roughly the same age as the Uzumaki.

"What are you doing here? This meeting's only for people who graduated." a boy who'd gone to confront the Uzumaki said as the Uzumaki boy moved to pick his seat.

"You see the headband?" the Uzumaki said, "That means I've graduated."

Honor satisfied, the boy shrugged and went back to the conversation he was having with his friends. The Uzumaki then sat down at a desk near the middle of the room, next to a dark haired boy in a high-collared shirt whom he was almost 99% certain was a Uchiha since the kid looked like those sourpusses in the clan he used to like to needle back when he was a kid in order to deflate their oversized egos. Even after he'd gone and lost all of his siblings, he'd still found time to smile, unlike some drama queens in his clan that he could name.

After sitting down, the Uzumaki boy frowned for a second, then slid to the middle of the desk and gestured for him to come over and sit down. Unable to not comply, he moved and sat his ancient body down in a seat that had been designed for a child and therefore didn't have the leg room he needed, ignoring the curious and apprehensive looks that the children in the room who'd likely thought him to be a village official or something up until then shot him upon actually noticing him the instant he started displaying behavior which was outside the norm for them. Sighing, he turned to face the aisle since he did not want to hang around for who knew how long having his knees and his upper thighs crushed by the desk in front of him.

As soon as he sat down and got himself as settled as he could be, the Uzumaki turned and tried to get the attention of the scowling Uchiha boy who'd been simultaneously glaring at the class and determinedly ignoring it. The boy rather determinedly turned away from the Uzumaki, struggling to ignore him as well while a pink haired girl who'd been loudly pushing and shoving a Yamanaka girl in the doorway of the room looked nervously between him and the Uchiha boy, clearly wanting to be close to the Uchiha boy who was "ignoring" the Uzumaki, but too afraid to get close to him in order to do so. Seeing as he'd had that effect on children for ages, he dismissed it.

The Uzumaki finally gave up on getting the Uchiha boy's attention after several attempts.

"Damn bastard." the Uzumaki grumbled. "He thinks he's so special because he's the last of the Uchiha, and everyone gives him everything because of it."

"He's the last of the WHAT?!"

He was definitely going to be having words with Obito.


	4. Chapter 4

Madara sighed, wishing this farce would just be over soon. They had been left to wait by the Uzumaki boy's new sensei who had yet to arrive. The Instructor who'd accompanied the Uzumaki boy on the farce that had resulted in his accidental resurrection had already packed up and left more than an hour ago muttering something about how he'd strangle the Hatake if it wouldn't provide him with yet another excuse for being even later for something else. He himself would be making his displeasure with the Jounin known when the man whose name he recognized from young Obito's constant ranting about why he had to get back home arrived. While he wasn't the most punctual of people, he hadn't appreciated his young relative Obito's habit of procrastination that would have had him be late for everything if they hadn't been trapped in the same damn cave with each-other.

This man was even slower to do things than Obito whom he'd re-christened Tobi was.

Speaking of Tobi, he would be having words with that little brat the next time he saw him. Wiping out the Uchiha clan wasn't exactly part of the plan, though there were good odds that it would've eventually happened during the final stage. Due to that whole Clan Loyalty thing that had been drilled into him practically since birth, he'd been planning on giving the descendants of his former kin a final chance before he killed them off himself, seeing as every last one of those who'd cast him out had died off and a fair few of their descendants might've accepted him as their leader much as Tobi eventually had. That last chance apparently wasn't to be however, since his minion had gone and rather terminally sorted out his family issues, permanently taking the option off the table.

Despite the fact that his clan had turned their backs on him long ago, choosing this broken village which had proven to be the death trap he'd foreseen it would be over true peace, he was surprised to find that learning of the death of his clan actually stung. So much so in fact, that he'd barely noticed his surroundings until he had been the only one in the room. The Uzumaki boy having gotten up to some antics that had resulted in him being beaten up by the Kunoichi of his graduating class, the boy's class divided into teams after the Instructor had finally arrived, and the students sent out to lunch.

On the surface, this Academy which the brat who'd summoned him would eventually be departing from in the company of a Jounin who would've been a smear on the wall were he younger and feeling more up to it was everything he and Hashirama had dreamed of when they were children. Look beneath the surface however, and you'd see that this place was fatally flawed and broken just as the village as a whole was.

Part of the reason the village was broken was because Tobirama had been quietly stirring resentment in the background, handing out favors such as choice bits of property on which to build homes to the allies of the Senju and alienating the Uchiha and their allies as well as anyone else that Tobirama personally disliked for whatever reason. Another part was that Hashirama could only see the first cessation of fighting in his lifetime and refused to correct course or rein his beloved brother in until it was too late and the damage had been done. That, and the fact that with the new village system, it would now be the ninja themselves who would be seeking to expand their territory rather than the countries that had previously sponsored them and garnered resentment from the ninja who depended on them to survive because they were forced to fight in conflicts in which they personally had no stake.

With something personal at stake, the resulting wars could only be and were that much worse. The longish periods of peace between each of the Shinobi World Wars were only rebuilding periods during which the villages got their numbers back up for yet another conflict in which all of the smaller countries that were trapped between the larger ones became collateral damage.

He'd seen what was coming long ago, knew that things would be eventually coming to a head, but everyone had been too busy enjoying the calm before the storm to listen to him. Even his own clan who'd very easily put the conflict aside and cast aside their resentment because back then, it had only been business after all. Very deadly business that had pitted families against each-other for generations until all everyone living could remember was war, but business nonetheless.

The Uzumaki who had nearly paid the ultimate price, leaving behind only a few scattered descendants like his summoner who was currently putting an eraser in the jamb of the sliding door that led into the room, had been only one of dozens upon dozens of casualties of this flawed system. Great works of Sealing the likes of which the world had never seen before and would never see again were now lost to the ages. The Hatake who'd never been particularly numerous and were now whittled down to the silver-haired brat who had just come in that was strangely reminding him of Tobirama and getting his dander up as a result were another casualty.

As he followed the Uzumaki boy and his little teammates to the roof, he felt a faint spark of the old fire that made him want to go all out against the Hatake brat. And, that was all, just a spark. The fire had been long-since banked by age, and he just couldn't - not to sound crude, but for a lack of a better term - he just couldn't get it up anymore.

He wasn't particularly bloodthirsty off the battlefield, and despite the reputation he'd earned in his youth, he didn't kill when it wasn't necessary, but on the battlefield...

The rush was incomparable. That knowledge that you were teetering on that knife's edge between life and death, and that feeling that you were invincible as you slaughtered score after score of the enemy. The even greater rush as you faced someone who might actually be a threat, someone who had even the slightest chance of killing you. The greatest fun of all, going up against Hashirama who was always just a hair better than he was no matter how many times he thought that he'd finally equaled or surpassed him. There was nothing like it, and it always, always, always went to his head.

That fire was gone now, which was just as well considering the comedown afterwards. While the battlefield high may be the best kind of high he'd ever had, the crash afterwards...

* * *

"...And, so you see, while I may have fudged one or two minor...Okay, stating that I was Uchiha Madara who was using an immortality jutsu that involved possessing a descendant of mine was a flat out lie...But, since we're all working for Madara to create a world without lies and all that, I didn't really..." Obito said, attempting to placate one of the most valuable members of the Akatsuki.

He'd gotten here as quickly as he could, Kamui being good for that sort of thing. It wasn't fast enough however, as information had already gotten to Kisame via Itachi who kept his finger on the pulse of current events in Konoha and was never more than two days behind when it came to knowing about important events despite his distance from the village.

He was in hot water with Kisame who'd known of his "treachery" for several days now, but in a toss up between being in deep shit with Kisame and being in it with Madara as he would be should he denounce him as a fraud in order to salvage things, he'd choose Kisame any day of the week. Though, he really didn't want to be in it with either of them despite the fact that it was inevitable that he'd be in trouble either way.

Despite being dangerous and potentially very troublesome, Kisame wasn't a physical threat to him thanks to Kamui, but if the sharklike swordsman ever decided to turn against the Akatsuki, only Itachi and Pein would really be able to stand against him which would be trouble for his and Madara's plans. The damage Kisame alone could cause is near incalculable, and could undo years of work in the span of hours. While all of the Akatsuki's nine members were S-ranked missing nin, not all S-ranked ninja were equal as Kakuzu's constantly killing his partners illustrates, and Kisame was a top-tier member of the group. Not the best, but he could take out several members before he was finally taken down if he chose to go against them.

Sure, he would be able to take Kisame down if he so chose, but there'd be Itachi to deal with afterwards, and if he had a single exploitable weakness as a result of his fight with Kisame...

He knew full well that Itachi viewed him as a threat to both his brother and Konoha despite the promises he'd made to the effect of leaving both alone so long as Itachi was alive, and that the younger Uchiha wouldn't hesitate to take him out if he thought he might have a chance of being able to do so. Part of what had restrained Itachi previously was the belief that he was Uchiha Madara and therefore immortal. That particular advantage was gone now however, and the first sign of any weakness whatsoever would have Itachi on him like white on rice.

"Who are you?" Itachi who'd been silently studying him intently throughout his entire explanation to Kisame who'd fortunately restrained himself long enough to hear asked.

"No-one." he replied, hoping that he didn't sound defensive. Normally he wouldn't, but...

"Seeing as Madara's back to re-take his name, you can call me Tobi." he eventually said after Itachi gave him that look that his mother could do which never failed to make him feel guilty and confess to sins real or imagined in order to get her to stop.

"Tobi...To...To-nii...Bito-nii" Itachi who apparently had a long memory and was quick on the uptake said.

As Kisame who'd only just barely held his temper in check long enough to hear an explanation reached for his sword, clearly ready to make good on his "If you're lying to me I'll kill you" promise, Itachi's eye gave that twitch his father's used to when he'd said or did something that made his brain break. Usually such an occurrence happened at least twice a week with his father, but this was completely new and somewhat out of character for the normally stoic Itachi who hadn't so much as twitched when a spider the size of his hand had crawled across his face last year. Considering the extreme reaction, he found himself wondering what it was that his young cousin had tried and failed to compute.

"Bito-nii, what did Madara _do _to you?!" Itachi loudly exclaimed, causing Kisame to drop his sword and stare at his normally silent partner who hadn't made a goddamned sound when his hand had been skewered by a senbon that one time in shock.


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Note to the guest reviewer Narusaku: Are you even aware that you posted some chapters of one of your stories in my reviews?! I mean seriously, I go looking at the review notices in my e-mail and went What. The. Fuck?!**

**Now on with the story...**

Hibachi and Ami who had known each-other since before the Academy since their mothers used to drop them off at the same daycare sat together on a rooftop watching the people pass below as they tried to keep their minds off of what would be coming for them in the morning. While their parents had been proud of their Academy graduation, going as far as to give them presents, they had grown quieter and quieter in the week between graduation and Team Assignment.

It had almost been as if they knew about the surprise test...

Ami wasn't Hibachi's usual crew, but since they would be teammates soon, he figured he may as well hang out with her despite the fact that she was a girly girl. If Ami hadn't been a kunoichi from a small shinobi family, odds were that she would've been having tea parties with teddy bears or whatever the heck it was that civilian girls did. The fact that she constantly fawned over that bastard Uchiha was bad enough in his book. Fortunately, he knew her and could stand her in small doses, so that was a plus.

"What's with that?" Ami exclaimed, pulling him out of his musings on tomorrow's exam.

The girl was pointing to the old man who was trailing after the Dead Last. He had absolutely no idea who the old man was or even why he'd be following Naruto of all people. When he'd first caught sight of him back at the Academy, he'd thought that the man was one of the village elders who was doing a tour of the Academy for whatever reason, probably because of the expensive new windows that had drawn complaints from his own grandfather, mainly as the windows had had to be put in because Naruto had happened to the old ones. That theory had been blown out of the water however when the old man had sat down next to Naruto.

There had been some chatter amongst the adults over the past week that had something to do with Naruto and an old man, but like most kids he hadn't really paid any attention, having gotten used to tuning his parents out when they started talking about the Uzumaki. If he didn't know for a fact that Naruto was a clanless orphan as his parents had constantly repeated this fact, he would swear that the old man was his great-grandfather or something. That couldn't be the case however, and who the old man was was a complete mystery to him, a mystery that he probably would've had solved earlier that day had the bastard Uchiha paid attention to Naruto's attempts to call his attention to the old man sitting next to him. Unfortunately, Sasuke had refused to so much as look in the old man's direction.

As he and Ami watched, an old man who had been passing the Uzumaki with the usual scowl rapidly paled upon spotting the old man who was trailing behind the boy, looked like he was about to have a heart attack, and started frantically making gestures meant to ward off evil. The old man who was following Naruto stopped upon spotting the man and gave him an evil smile that creeped him out despite the fact that he was all the way up here and presumably out of sight of anyone who wasn't actually looking for him.

"G-Good e-evening M-Madara-sama!" the younger looking old man who was trembling in his sandals stammered.

"Ah, Kenichi-kun. It's soo good to see you again," the wrinkled old geezer who now looked downright evil said. "You won't be attempting to throw any rocks through my window in the near future I trust."

"N-No M-Madara-s-sama I-I..." the old man whose name was apparently Kenichi stammered before becoming completely inaudible.

"That's good to hear." the older old man said. "Perhaps I could have Naruto help you bring your groceries home, they do look rather heavy."

"N-No that isn't..." Kenichi said before his courage apparently failed him and turned tail and fled.

Hibachi wasn't entirely sure about his lip-reading skills, but he thought he'd seen the old man say "I've still got it." as Kenichi disappeared around the corner.

He turned to look at Ami who'd turned to look at him.

"The hell was that all about?" Ami asked, summing up what they both were thinking.

* * *

The Hokage sighed as he repressed the urge to bury his face in his hands. This had been the third time this week that his men had been forced to roust the fringe and some of the not-so-fringe elements out of the emergency shelters which were starting to look like a shanty town. Fortunately, nobody had gone so far as to attack either Naruto or Madara. He knew that it would be an unmitigated disaster if someone were stupid enough to do so, considering the fact that Madara was the original God of Shinobi and now unkillable to boot. Word of Madara's revival had passed through the shinobi ranks like wildfire, but fortunately he'd caught things in time before the civilians could be let into the loop and panic as about a hundred and fifty shinobi who were convinced that it was the apocalypse had done.

Rather than screeching out a hundred different theories about how he was responsible for Madara's appearance or how the founding of the village itself was a conspiracy, the fringe jobs had all decided to agree on the fact that The End Is Nigh and decided to be elsewhere to ride out the coming storm. Those who didn't have their own private bunkers had flooded the Emergency shelters and set up a small, thriving, and somewhat insane civilization that had repeatedly had to be cleared out as Madara's presence in Konoha had quite fortunately not yet rated an actual emergency due to whatever the hell Naruto had done with the Edo Tensei.

For the first time, he didn't feel guilty that he'd had Naruto subtly discouraged from studying seals. He'd had Naruto re-create what he'd done to the Edo-Tensei contract seal to the best of his abilities before he'd made the boy promise to never use the technique again unless it were a truly dire situation and there were no other options, and the R&D team he'd handed it to had yet to make heads or tails of it. All they could say was that it was either insanely brilliant, or brilliantly insane.

"...And, Danzo was of no help whatsoever as he's locked himself in his office and refused to come out." The ANBU who was giving him the report on the latest eviction sweep of the emergency shelters said.

Danzo had been locked in his office for the entire week, and he knew why. And to think he'd almost entirely forgotten about his rival's near-crippling Madaraphobia. Back when they were young, Madaraphobia had been an actual illness and there had been a support group with weekly meetings. The villagers that scoff now would probably soon learn why should any of them be stupid enough to make the man whom even he stepped carefully around truly angry.

* * *

As he sat on the roof directly across from Naruto's window, Kakashi discreetly nodded to Tenzo who looked completely exhausted. The poor man probably hadn't had a wink of sleep this entire week. Tenzo had pretty much drawn permanent Naruto watching duty by virtue of his abilities thanks to Madara's arrival, and he'd taken his responsibilities very seriously, neglecting his own health and wellbeing in the process.

There were two others on a shift that usually rated only one ANBU making an hourly pass while on patrol, but Tenzo had apparently been unable to relax and allow himself to be relieved for fear of what would happen were he not there should Madara finally manage to make a move, as it was only a matter of time before the Uchiha managed to find a way around whatever the hell Naruto had done to him.

There was some whining coming from inside Naruto's apartment as the boy's evening routine had once again been disrupted by Madara whom the boy was strangely willing to take orders from which was worrisome in and of itself. Usually around now, the Uzumaki would've finished tending to his plants and would have been doing light aerobics as he watched his favorite anime. Madara had yet again turned off the t.v. however and stuck a book under the boy's nose. Hence the whining.

Deciding that tonight would be going the same as the last five nights had, and satisfied that Naruto was as safe as he could be in this situation, he turned and left. He hadn't slept all that much this week either, and he'd need his rest for tomorrow.

* * *

"You can't kill him." Itachi firmly stated as a massive sword sliced through where the lying snake Tobi was standing and once again failed to do anything.

"And, why not?" Kisame asked, not bothering to mention the obvious reason for why not which had caused Tobi to blow a raspberry in his mask at one point and then complain about how he'd gotten spit in his mask.

"I'm going to fix him so he'll be the way he used to be before Madara broke him." Itachi replied. "Bito-nii was the best cousin ever. He used to give me ice cream for breakfast and take me out for white chocolate mochas with extra caramel on top."

"Man, that's seriously evil." Kisame said, smirking at the audacity of loading a kid up on sugar and caffeine and dumping him on a pair of shinobi who could kill him a hundred different ways for doing so, and wondering why Itachi's parents had been stupid enough to allow that Obito guy who he'd seriously be killing the second he was sure he could get away with it to babysit his partner more than once.

Tobi or whatever the hell his name was was a lying bastard, but he sure had balls.


	6. Chapter 6

Naruto turned pale as he was brushing his teeth and realized he'd forgotten Madara's present which could be very, very bad considering. He hoped Old Man Madara liked the surprise he'd got for him. It was the best he could do on short notice considering how tough it was to get one of these things which apparently had to be raised from when they were babies since they could fight back and they were _mean_ when they did so, especially when you pulled one of their young out of its nest. He'd been pecked by the parents more times than he could count, and the baby that he'd acquired had scratched and pecked him as well. He'd damn near been driven over the side of the roof and he had bloody divots and scratches on his head, face, and hands. It was the least he could do for Madara however since he'd gone and summoned the old man from the Afterlife where he'd probably been happy with his family, and he didn't look too happy to be here.

Looking into the box he'd carefully hidden in his training room which Madara refused to enter since it was a "disaster area", he was relieved to see movement. Since it was alive, everything should be fine.

Madara liked birds, so this should make him very happy.

"Hey, old man!" he exclaimed as he came out of the training room.

"Yes?" Madara asked, looking at him as if he were seeing someone else entirely like he usually did, someone else he didn't exactly like but put up with because he had to.

"Seeing as you like birds and all, I got you this." he said as he thrust the box under the old man's nose.

* * *

Madara looked down at the box the Uzumaki boy had given him. Several days earlier, the boy had asked him what he'd liked to do with his free time when he wasn't fighting or polishing his kama which he mostly used as a makeshift cane now and he'd extolled the virtues of Falconry. Caring for and training birds of prey was both difficult and rewarding. Apparently, the boy who'd apologized for summoning him several times had taken his lecture to heart and was making an attempt at compensation. The box was rather small, which left him wondering what sort of bird he'd be raising.

Anticipation rising, he opened the lid as his curiosity got the better of him and peered inside. It was small, it was feathery, one of its little beady eyes stared up at him with an indolent bovine curiosity rather than a laserlike intensity, its little stringy legs were too long for its body, and it was dinner for the birds he usually kept.

"And, what am I supposed to hunt with this? Worms?" he asked as he held up the small sparrow chick that the Uzumaki child who'd apparently not paid any attention to his lecture on Falconry had presented to him, having apparently thought that he'd wanted a "pet bird".

"But I thought you said you liked sparrows." the Uzumaki boy mumbled, looking distinctly unhappy that his present hadn't gone over as well as he'd thought it would.

"Sparrow_hawks_, I like Sparrowhawks you idiot!" he said, not paying one whit of attention to the annoyed cheeping that came from the bird he'd still been holding as he waved his hands for emphasis.

The Uzumaki looked like he was about to cry for about half a second before he scowled cutely, turned his back on him, and stormed over to his bed which he flopped down on, his back facing him. Based on his posture, the boy would remain that way for the rest of the night, sulking at the so-called insult he'd given him.

If anything was an insult, it was that damn bird that was cheeping hungrily, having become somewhat resigned to the rough handling it was receiving lately.

Sighing, he grabbed the most recently caught fly out of the spider web in the corner and started feeding it to the small creature that the almost completely oblivious Uzumaki had given him one leg at a time. He was almost tempted to feed the creature the wildflower seeds that the boy had set aside for planting tomorrow. Almost.

As he set the bird back in its little box with a bottlecap full of water in case it got thirsty, he found he couldn't help but smile slightly. This was something that Hashirama would have pulled...Were he almost completely braindead that was.

* * *

Tenzo stabbed himself in the hand with a senbon when he realized he was nodding off. Had a civilian tried to stay awake for about a week like he had, there would have been serious reprecussions including possible personality changes for the worse amongst other things. As it was, he was really, really, really pushing it and had gotten to that point where he was too tired to sleep and only able to focus on one thing, Naruto.

He could see the boy through the window of the small apartment that was obviously the home of a pair of bachelors, what with the pile of dirty dishes in the sink and the clean and dirty laundry piles. And, while he was afraid of what Madara would do to the boy given half a chance, all he'd really seen the man do was give the boy a few light smacks on the head as he showed the boy how to properly cook something that wasn't ramen and tried to teach the boy who couldn't sit still for five minutes if his life depended on it how to read properly, stating each time that he refused to be forced to live with a total fucking idiot, and that at the very least the brat was going to be able to properly be able to feed itself and properly read and write.

Naruto was currently sulking because the present he'd pulled from the rain gutter that morning hadn't gone over as well as he thought it would, but then again Madara was a Uchiha, and with the exception of a few individuals, the Uchiha were ungrateful bastards who would spit on what you gave them. He personally thought the sparrow was a very thoughtful gift, especially since the Uzumaki boy had risked his life to get it, almost falling off the building at one point, being forced to hold onto the rain gutter with one hand as the the sparrow's parents had harassed him.

If he'd been given...

Turtle sighed as he pulled the sedative laced senbon out of Tenzo's backside. Had his colleague been more on his game he wouldn't have been caught so completely off guard like this. He needed it however, since he completely refused to get the rest he should be getting so he could be able to defend Konoha should Madara finally become a viable threat. Picking the other shinobi up, he slung him over the shoulder and carried him off to the hospital as his and Tenzo's previously arranged relief arrived.

* * *

Itachi sat staring into the fire. Kisame had asked him why he wanted to save 'Bito-nii despite everything he'd done, and he'd been forced to face his reasons. Part of it was because aside from Sasuke, he was the only living family he had left. Part of it was because he remembered what 'Bito-nii had been like before he'd been expertly broken by Madara who'd been skilled at such things. Part of it was because of Shisui who, due to the late age at which his father Kagami had had him, was younger than his nephew. Shisui had loved Obito, and he owed it to his favorite cousin to at least try to save him.

'Bito-nii had been the one who gave him sweets, but he'd also been the one who had been unafraid to take the Clan Head's son to the park to play on the swings or roll in the dirt with one of the Inuzuka children rather than try to teach him how to properly throw senbon or try to teach him kata. 'Bito-nii had tried to let him be a kid, which was more than could be said of even his own parents. Each time he was caught and scolded for his unUchihalike actions and his attempts at "corrupting" him, the teen was repentant for all of five minutes, and unafraid to take him somewhere "inappropriate" again as soon as his parent's backs were turned.

The bloodthirsty monster who'd slaughtered the clan by his side was not 'Bito-nii. It was quite possible that Madara had completely destroyed 'Bito-nii and that he'd never get him back, but he had to try, if only to prove to himself that there might be hope for his own future redemption.

His hands weren't completely unstained with the blood of the innocent after all, and if 'Bito-nii was a monster, what would that make him?


	7. Chapter 7

Naruto grumbled as the covers were dragged off of him and he was dragged out of bed a good half hour before the alarm he'd set was due to go off. Seeing Madara's face first thing in the morning wasn't enjoyable. In fact, it was nearly heart-stoppingly frightening if you weren't expecting it.

"What the hell did you do that for?! It's not time to get up yet!" he snarled, glaring at the grey pre-dawn sky that could be seen through the window he'd set his bed by so the morning sun could wake him back before he'd gotten the alarm clock.

"Seeing as this test you're going to undertake is important for your future in this village, you should prepare for it." Madara said. "Though this whole village and the rest of this world is broken and needs to be replaced. The never-ending cycle of violence won't stop until it is."

"What's all that about?" he asked.

"It's a long story that starts a very long time ago." Madara said. "The ninja world was a mistake that should not have happened. Ninja never end the fighting, they just create more."

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"Long ago, the Shinju created the world and stood sentinel over it, indifferent to all on it who worshiped it as a god. Every thousand years, the Shinju would bear a fruit. Once, during a period of endless warfare, the princess Otsutsuki Kaguya stole the forbidden fruit from the tree and ate it. Eating the fruit gave the princess godlike powers which she used to end the wars. The tree grew angry at this, and took on a monstrous form in order to claim the power that was stolen from it, a form that would one day be known as the Jyuubi. One day, the princess gave birth to a son named Otsutsuki Hagoromo who was born with the ability to use Chakra. This boy would grow up and defeat the Jyuubi and seal it within itself." Madara started.

"As Hagoromo who was worshiped as a god for his feat grew older, he wandered the lands and shared the secrets of the ninja arts with the people, becoming known as the Sage of the Six Paths. As he was nearing his death, he realized that the Jyuubi would be free to rampage across the lands, so he sealed its body inside the moon and divided its Chakra into nine parts which became the nine Biju. Following this, the Sage lay on his deathbed where he called his two sons to him and asked his sons what the true key to peace was. The elder who inherited his eyes answered "Power". The younger who had inherited his physical prowess answered "Love". The sage left his legacy to the younger son which made the elder intensely jealous and sparked fights between the brothers who were the ancestors of the Senju and the Uchiha, continuing the cycle of endless war rather than bringing peace to the world." Madara continued his tale.

"There had been a time when I had thought that Hashirama and I had found the key to peace, but after a while I realized the new system was just as broken as the old one and that the world needed to be remade for there to be true peace. Hashirama refused to listen however, believing that the village we had created was the fulfillment for our dream, and refusing to see that it had been broken from the start. Tobirama adding to the conflict in the background and slighting the Uchiha every step of the way didn't help." Madara finished.

"What was that about the tree?" he asked, not knowing how some giant tree had led to Konoha being broken, and not understanding where those Biju things came into it.

The old man looked like he wanted to strangle him. Then again, lots of people looked like they wanted a strangle him after he asked a question. Even Mizuki while he was pretending to be nice in order to set him up.

"Just...Just get out of my sight." the old man said, shaking his head. "I swear, he's worse than Tobi."

Grumbling, he grabbed his clothes for the day and headed into his training room in order to get dressed and grab a few things he might need for the survival exercise that Madara had called a test that he would be undertaking soon. Not having breakfast wasn't going to be much of a challenge, seeing as he needed to do some grocery shopping later. His milk was off, so were his eggs, and he was out of cereal, meaning all he had was Instant ramen.

A cheeping sound coming from the main room indicated that Madara's bird was awake.

"Here you go you little worm sucker." Madara grumbled from the other side of the training room door.

* * *

Danzo cautiously peered out the door of his office then, upon seeing the empty hallway, he cautiously made his way down it. Upon noticing that the next hallway was mercifully clear of the Uchiha who'd probably want revenge for that item he'd left on his doorstep shortly before his last duel with the Shodai Hokage, he made his way down that. Checking both ways down the T intersection, he made his way down the next hall, glad that there was no sign of Madara so far. Hopefully, he would be able to make his way to the main meeting hall in order to issue orders without running into the man who'd been brought back from the dead by the Jinchuriki.

Madaraphobia may seem ridiculous this day and age, especially considering how old the revived Madara was, but there are some fears that people don't let go of throughout their lives, and this one wasn't entirely a baseless one. Fear of Madara was quite sensible, much as fear of the Yondaime had been in Iwa following the Third War.

He'd met one or two impostors who'd claimed they were Madara over the years, but they'd lacked the certain something that Madara possessed. He wasn't a natural Chakra sensor, but there are some people who make such an impression on you that you never forget them no matter how hard you try.

Back when he was a little kid, he'd made the rather dumb mistake of throwing a rock at Madara. Half a second later, the man had grabbed him by the throat and one-handedly slammed him into a nearby building before calmly lecturing him on exactly why doing something like that was a terminally stupid idea. The man had then sneered in disgust at him when he noticed he'd wet himself, before dropping him into the puddle of his own urine.

He'd been deathly afraid of Madara ever since.

That hadn't stopped him from anonymously leaving a flaming bag of dog feces on the man's doorstep though.

A flaming bag of crap that Madara was sure to get his revenge on him for.

* * *

"There's no way that _he_ has control over Madara no matter what you heard. I saw him running errands for him yesterday evening." one of the elderly early-morning shoppers whispered to another, completely ignoring Sasuke for the first time in years.

Instead of giving him looks of pity as he passed, Naruto and the old man he'd turned up to the team assignments with currently absorbed everyone's attention despite the fact that they weren't in the vicinity. People were claiming that the ancient man was Uchiha Madara himself returned from the dead, but that was impossible, since Madara had died way back when he was in his prime.

The Uzumaki had tried to get his attention, and tried to get him to talk to the old man he'd brought with him the day before, but he'd resolutely ignored both. He'd had his mind on other things yesterday, more important things than some creepy old man who looked like that great-uncle he'd been told to stay away from and never ever accept candy from. He was one step closer to growing strong enough to defeat Itachi. He'd just have to pass today's survival exercise in order to go farther.

The Uzumaki better not hold him back.

* * *

Sakura sighed as she tried to make her way out the door without her mother noticing her. The woman was an early riser, and could be rather determined when she got something into her head. Currently, her mother was under the impression that her diet wasn't healthy, and she'd been trying to shove food down her throat lately. Getting out the door without breakfast as her new sensei had suggested was going to be a challenge, especially since she could smell eggs being fried already.

"Sakura!" her mother called out to her when she saw her bypassing the dining area and sneaking out the door.

"No time to stop mom, I'm going to be late!" she called back, hoping to make her way out of the door without any of the eggs her mother was fixing on the stove.

"Alright." her mother said with a sigh. "But, you watch out for that Uzumaki boy and that old man he's got with him, they're dangerous."

Shaking her head at the warning, she slipped her sandals on and headed out the door. She had no idea why her mother seemed to think that that Naruto clown was dangerous. The only thing she'd be in danger of around him would be being asked out again. That incredibly ancient looking old man that Naruto had brought with him yesterday didn't look all that dangerous either. Creepy yes, dangerous no.

Making her way down the road, she concentrated on other things, more important things such as what Sasuke would want for lunch. Maybe now that they were teammates they could have lunch together. Either way, being on Sasuke's team meant that she was ahead of the Ino-Pig in the running when it came to Sasuke's affections.


End file.
